Normal and aberrant functions of integrins in the adult central nervous system

Integrins are heterodimeric proteins mediating cell-cell and cell-extracellular matrix adhesive connections (Springer T.A., 1990, Nature 346, 425–434) and signal transduction across the plasma membrane. The important roles of integrins in neural development and cancer, where they subserve process outgrowth and cell migration, are well documented, but information on integrins in the adult central nervous system has been slower to arrive. Now that strong evidence, both molecular biological and immunocytochemical, has been collected, it is useful to speculate on what these interesting proteins may be doing in the adult central nervous system. Suggestive data now points to roles in functions characterized in part by morphological rearrangements, such as learning and memory, and injury responses.